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ON NAZARETH HILL 



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Stereograph copyrighted by Underwood eT Underwood, N. Y. 
NAZARETH FROM LITTLE HERMON 



ON NAZARETH HILL 



BY 

ALBERT EDWARD BAILEY 

LECTURER IN RELIGIOUS EDUCATION 
NEWTON THEOLOGICAL INSTITUTION 




THE PILGRIM PRESS 

BOSTON NEW YORK CHICAGO 






COPYRIGHT, 1915 
BY ALBERT EDWARD BAILEY 



THE 'PLIMPTON 'PRESS 
NORWOOD' MASS -U'S-A 



NOV 3 1915 



>GI.A414396 



TO 

THE MOTHER AND FIRST SPIRITUAL 

TEACHER OF MY CHILDREN 



LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 

Nazareth from Little Hermon Frontispiece - 

Map of Esdraelon and Lower Galilee Facing page 56 

View South from Nazareth Hill 58 

Nazareth Looking East 60 " 

The Place of Sacrifice 62 

Mary's Fountain, Nazareth 64 " 

Mount Carmel and the Plain of Acre 66 ' 

Mount Carmel and the Kishon 68 

Tell Megiddo 70 

The Ruins of Megiddo 72 1 

The Plain of Dothan 74 

The Hill of Samaria 76 

Herod's Colonnade 78 

Jacob's Well and Mount Ebal 80 

Ruins at Jacob's Well 82 

View North from Jezreel 84 

Gideon's Fountain 86 

Nain and Mount Tabor 88 

The Sea of Galilee 90 

The Plain of Gennesaret 92 

A Caravan 94 ' 

Sepphoris 96 

Ptolemais (Acre) 98 1 

[vii] 



ON NAZARETH HILL 

IT is an afternoon in spring. All day 
the little shop has resounded with the 
blow of mallet and the swish of bow- 
lathe. But now the carpenter hangs 
up his tools, and turning to the lad who 
has been his helper says: 

" Come, son, enough of work ! There 
are yet two hours before sunset, before 
the Sabbath comes with its rest and 
its worship. Let us climb the hill 
together." 

Together they put up the front of 
wood before the entrance to their cave- 

Ci] 



ON NAZARETH HILL 



shop, and having secured it with bar 
and lock, turn to the narrow path that 
leads upward between the little stone 
huts of their village. As they climb, 
the hills begin to peer at them over the 
southern brim of the bowl-shaped valley 
in which Nazareth lies — Ebal purple 
with distance; Moreh close at hand, 
gray and bare; westward the haunch 
of Carmel, spotted with oaks; south- 
eastward grim Gilboa, which with Mo- 
reh all but blocks the view to Gilead 
whose deeply-cloven sides are burning 
in the evening sun like an opal pink 
and purple. And now as they near 
the top they look down upon Esdraelon, 
that sea-like plain whose further waves 

[2] 



ON NAZARETH HILL 



break upon Samaria fifteen miles away, 
and whose nearer are lost beneath the 
precipitous cliffs of the hills of Naza- 
reth. There is no haze to blur the im- 
age. Every village on its vast surface 
stands out sharp and brown. On 
the hither side every checker-patch 
of new-plowed land glows red, and 
every strip of field tells by the particu- 
lar hue of green that clothes it the story 
of its sowing. But before the eye has 
traversed half the plain the stripes 
and checkers fuse into streaks of 
purple, and the purple melts into the 
violet of the southern hills. And over 
the enameled plain drift the cloud- 
shadows. 

[3] 



ON NAZARETH HILL 



The boy has been running ahead 
and like a young goat of the flock scorn- 
ing the zigzag path for more precipi- 
tous courses. 

"Here is the very top, father!" he 
cries; "I can see down the other 
side into the long valley of Sep- 
phoris. There to the west is the sea, 
and northward over Safed is great 
Hermon!" 

"Yes, the very top!" says the car- 
penter as he toils up at last. "Surely 
Moses on Pisgah saw no fairer land, 
from the scarlet flowers at our feet to 
the 'excellency of Carmel and Sharon' 
and the 'glory of Lebanon.' 'He hath 
made everything beautiful in its time!' 

[4] 



ON NAZARETH HILL 



"But, son, I have come up here with 
you for another reason. There is no 
landscape in all our country so filled 
with meaning for Jehovah's people; 
no spot like this where one can gather 
at a single sweep the great lessons of 
our history. Many a time you have 
heard from your mother's lips and mine 
the stories of this plain and of these 
hills; but now I want to go over them 
again with you, so that when next week 
we journey to the Holy City and for 
the first time you stand within its gates 
and become a 'son of the Law,' the 
Doctors will not think your parents 
have been neglectful." 

Together they sit upon a heap of 

[5] 



ON NAZARETH HILL 



stones that some shepherd has piled 
among the flowers — the lad between 
his father's knees — and the great 
review begins. 

L)0 you see here to the west this 
long ridge of Carmel, its back rippling 
like the back of a grayhound as he 
crouches to spring? And on the flank 
there to the south-west, that solitary 
white spot against the sky? What is 
that?" 

"That, father, is the altar that marks 
where Elijah overcame the priests of 
Baal." 

"Yes, my son, that spot commemo- 
rates a glorious victory! Our people 

[6] 



ON NAZARETH HILL 



had forgotten Jehovah; they had de- 
nied the God that led their fathers 
across the Red Sea and through the 
wilderness, that smote great kings 
before them, that gave them this 
goodly heritage. Wicked Jezebel with 
her priests from Sidon had thrown 
down Jehovah's altars and had made 
Baal the god of the land ; and all Israel 
was worshiping him under every green 
tree and beside every spring. Then 
came Elijah the Tishbite like a flash of 
lightning upon Ahab: 'Gather to me 
all Israel unto Mt. Carmel, and the 
prophets of Baal four hundred and fifty' 
— and there in the presence of the 
king and all the multitude he proved 

[7] 



ON NAZARETH HILL 



the impotence of Baal and the living 
power of Jehovah!" 

"But why did he have to kill the 
priests?" 

"Why, you see, my son, it was a great 
crisis in our history. If Jezebel had 
had her way she would have blotted 
out all memory of Jehovah forever. 
There was need of the sternest action. 
I suppose that Elijah felt himself to 
be the minister of that righteous law 
which says Thou shalt have no other 
gods before me. . . . He that sacri- 
ficeth to any god save to Jehovah only, 
shall be utterly destroyed'; he felt 
that he was heir to all those prece- 
dents of doom from the serpent-plague 

[8] 



ON NAZARETH HILL 



in the Wilderness to the pestilence 
at Peor. 'Our God is a consuming 
fire!"' 

"Must all prophets of God destroy 
the wicked as he did?" 

"Not without God's command, cer- 
tainly. Amos and Isaiah did not kill. 
But perhaps the cup of wrath in their 
day was not full." 

"Do you think, father, that the 
Messiah wiU be like Elijah?" 

"I don't know, son. When I think 
of the Roman legions in every city, 
the Roman eagles in the very courts 
of Jehovah, I tremble to think of what 
the Messiah might have to do. The 
prophets speak of a terrible day of 

[9] 



ON NAZARETH HILL 



Jehovah when ' He will break them with 
a rod of iron and dash them in pieces 
like a potter s vessel. 

"Mother says she prefers to think 
of those other verses about the Mes- 
siah: 

* The bruised reed he will not break, the 
smoking flax he will not quench. . . . 
He shall lead his flock like a shep- 
herd." 

'Yes, the prophets say that about 
him, too." 

"Will the great Doctors at Jerusa- 
lem tell me what the Messiah will be 
like if I ask them?" 

"You may ask them, laddie!" 

do] 



ON NAZARETH HILL 



IN OW following the sky line to the left 
of Carmel do you see where the hills 
break and a deep shadow runs out to- 
ward us to a little village on the plain's 
edge? That is the pass of Megiddo, the 
chief highway of armies from Sharon 
into Galilee. Every army that ever 
swept across this plain made that pass 
its entrance or its exit. Behind the 
village you see the fortress where the 
Roman legion guards the defile. What 
happened there, son?" 

"That is where good king Josiah met 
his death. He came to attack the king 
of Egypt because the king of Egypt 
was going to attack the king of Baby- 
lon, Josiah's ally." 

En] 



ON NAZARETH HILL 



" Right. And a more unfortunate 
thing could not have occurred than 
good Josiah's death. I never could 
understand such a providence. Josiah 
had just purified the land of idols, 
swept away all the abominations of his 
father Manasseh, repaired the temple, 
restored the Law; and he was just 
beginning a reign that would have 
brought righteousness and prosperity 
and peace to Israel. Yet he was cut 
off by an untimely fate, and the king- 
dom soon fell to the sword of Babylon. 
Why should God allow it!" 

"The Rabbi at the synagogue told us 
boys once that king Josiah was foolish 
to attack Necho ; he should have stayed 

[12] 



ON NAZARETH HILL 



at home. He said that God never saved 
anyone who was rash. I asked the 
Rabbi if God would save the Messiah 
if he should jump off the high cliff 
below the village, and the Rabbi said 
that the Messiah wouldn't tempt God 
that way. Perhaps Josiah tempted 
God." 

"Perhaps so, son." 

THERE'S another little village hud- 
dling close under the hills to the south 
of us. Do you know what happened 
atTaanach?" 

"No, father, not at Taanach; but 
near Taanach I know that Sisera and 
his Canaanites were defeated." 

[i3] 



ON NAZARETH HILL 



"That's right. And do you remem- 
ber how Deborah sings: 

' The kings came and fought; 
Then fought the kings of Canaan, 
In Taanach by the waters of Megiddo: 
They took no gain of money. 
From heaven fought the stars, 
From their courses they fought against 

Sisera. 
The river Kishon swept them away, 
That ancient river, the river Kishon. 
my soul, march on with strength! ' 

You can see the long line of their march 
from Harosheth here at the extreme 
right, where the Kishon breaks through 
between Carmel and the hills of Galilee. 

[i4] 



ON NAZARETH HILL 



They straggled along the plain, think- 
ing to cut us in two — the tribes of 
the north from the tribes of the south. 
They trusted in their chariots of iron; 
but Deborah and Barak trusted in the 
living God! Up from Sinai Jehovah 
came and smote them: 

'Jehovah, when thou wentest forth out 

of Seir, 
When thou marchedst out of the field 

of Edom, 
The earth trembled, the heavens also 

dropped, 
Yea, the clouds dropped water. 
The mountains quaked at the presence 

of Jehovah' 

[i5] 



ON NAZARETH HILL 



So the Canaanite fled; his power was 
broken, and the wicked rites with which 
he meant to ensnare Israel perished 
with him!" 

"What rites do you mean, father?" 
"This is what I mean. A man in 
Taanach while digging a cistern last 
summer came upon a piece of wall, 
evidently part of an old city wall. 
There was a great threshold of stone 
with sockets in it and the stumps of 
doorposts at either end. And as he 
dug below it he found a jar, still whole, 
and in the jar the bones of a little child. 
The king of Taanach when he built 
the city must have slain his own son 
to purchase the gods' favor. Israel 

[16] 



ON NAZARETH HILL 



had begun to practise these bloody 
customs. Do you remember how Hiel 
the Bethelite rebuilt Jericho? — 'He 
laid the foundation thereof with the 
loss of Abiram his first born, and set 
up the gates thereof with the loss of 
his youngest son Segub.' If Canaan 
had conquered us at Taanach we might 
still be offering human sacrifices, and 
I today might have no first-born son! 
But Jehovah has taught us a better 
way. We may not offer the 'fruit of 
our body for the sin of our soul,' but 
may sacrifice a bullock or a sheep or 
even two turtle-doves." 

" What is the sacrifice for, father? 
Why does God want something killed? " 

[17] 



ON NAZARETH HILL 



'"Without the shedding of blood 
there is no remission of sins.' The 
Rabbis tell us that God being righteous 
demands the death of the sinner; but 
since we have all sinned, he allows us 
to redeem ourselves by offering a sub- 
stitute. God accepts the life of the 
victim instead of our life. 'If a man 
sin/ says Leviticus, 'let him bring a 
lamb without spot, and the priest shall 
kill it before Jehovah and shall make 
atonement for him concerning his sin, 
and he shall be forgiven.' ' 

"Yes, father, I learned the verses at 
the synagogue. But mother taught 
me some verses that are different. 
Listen: 

[18] 



ON NAZARETH HILL 



'I hate, I despise your feasts, and I will 
take no delight in your solemn assem- 
blies. Yea, though ye offer me your 
burnt-offerings and meal-offerings I 
will not accept them. . . . But let 
justice roll down as waters, and right- 
eousness as a mighty stream.' And 
David says, 'For thou delightest not in 
sacrifice; else would I give it. . . The 
sacrifices of God are a broken spirit: 
a broken and a contrite heart, God, 
thou wilt not despise.' 
Mother says that she dares not refuse 
the lamb, but she does not see why God 
needs the sacrifice. I asked the Rabbi 
why we had to bring sacrifices and he 
said 'Because it is the Law.' Do you 

[19] 



ON NAZARETH HILL 



think the great Doctors would tell me 
why the Law says one thing and the 
Prophets another?" 

"I don't know, my boy. You may 
ask. But this I know: we must obey 
the Law till God shows us clearly some 
better way." 

J UST above Taanach is a saddle in the 

nearer range of hills, and another saddle 

in the farther range. Beyond the first 

is little Dothan; beyond the second 

is great Sebaste, old Samaria. Do you 

remember what happened in those 

places?" 

''Yes, father. In Dothan Joseph 

was sold by his brethren and carried 
[ 2 o] 



ON NAZARETH HILL 



to Egypt. I always loved Joseph, be- 
cause when he had his brothers in his 
power and could have harmed them — 
as they deserved to be harmed — he 
forgave them and saved them and their 
families from the famine. I asked 
mother once, 'If Joseph had been 
Elijah, would he have put to death 
the priests of Baal?' But she only 
smiled and asked me what I would 
have done! Father, did you ever go 
down to Egypt?" 

'Yes, once, when you were little — 
too little to remember." 

''' There is another Dothan story that 
I like. The prophet Elisha and his 
servant were once surrounded by the 

[21] 



ON NAZARETH HILL 



chariots of Syria. The servant was 
afraid, till God opened his eyes and 
showed him the mountains round 
about, filled with horses and chariots of 
fire. Father, does God send angels to 
protect everybody, or only prophets?" 
"What says the Psalm? — ' The angel 
of the Lord encampeth round about 
them that fear Him, and delivereth 
them.' And I think he sends a triple 
guard for those who are too young to 
protect themselves, — father, mother 
and the angels!" 

1 HEN just over the second range is 
wicked Sebaste — 'the proud coronet 
of the drunkards of Ephraim' which 

[22] 



ON NAZARETH HILL 



Assyria destroyed and Herod rebuilt 
to please his Roman master. There 
Herod murdered his wife Mariamne and 
his two sons; there the heathen hold 
their shows in the stadium and the 
theater that he built. The name of 
Jehovah is not heard there. It is a city 
abhorred. And round about it live 
the Samaritans who say they are Jews 
but are not. Jews have no dealings 
with Samaritans. When we go up to 
the feasts at Jerusalem, we Jews of 
Galilee usually take the longer road 
through Perea so that we need not pass 
through their borders." 

"Why do the Jews despise them, 
father? Are they wicked men?" 

[>3] 



ON NAZARETH HILL 



"Not necessarily. But years ago 
they married heathen wives and would 
not divorce them to come under the 
law of Ezra. Our fathers would not 
let them worship in the temple. Then 
they built a temple of their own 
on Mt. Gerizim; and ever since, the 
two peoples have gone their separate 
ways. The years have not softened 
the hatred." 

"When the Messiah comes, father, 
will he rule over the Samaritans also?" 

"I do not know. The Samaritans 
are looking for a Messiah." 

"Then when he comes, will the two 
peoples stop hating each other and all 
go up to Jerusalem to worship? " 

[24] 



ON NAZARETH HILL 



"Would to God it might be so, my 
son!" 

" Father, may we go through Samaria 
to the Passover?" 

" I was planning to return that way, 

JN OW see how the hills about Sebaste 
rise eastward into the great mass of 
Ebal and Gerizim. From here the two 
look like one mountain, but a deep 
shadow shows where a valley cuts them 
in two. Into that valley came our 
father Abraham, and there he set up 
his first altar to Jehovah in the land of 
promise. Into that valley came Jacob 
with his flocks. Eastward of it he 
bought his parcel of ground and digged 

[25] 



ON NAZARETH HILL 



his well. Into that valley came vic- 
torious Joshua and all Israel with him. 
There on the slopes of Ebal and Geri- 
zim he rehearsed before them the law 
of Jehovah and heard them shout the 
oath that Jehovah should be their God 
forever. Fickle people! Feeble oath! 
Ebal is the saddest mountain in this 
whole panorama; for it is a perpetual 
reminder of the faithlessness of Israel, 
of the curse fulfilled, of a people divided 
and scattered. 
'How long, God! Wilt thou be angry 

forever? 
Shall thy jealousy burn like a fire? 
Wherefore should the nations say 9 
Where is their God? ' 

C26] 



ON NAZARETH HILL 



AND there is old Gilboa! How finely 
its buttressing hills rise up from the 
plain to the bold crest, and how defi- 
antly the crest leaps down to Jordan! 
Famous old hill, witness of our most 
glorious triumph and of our most igno- 
minious defeat. Under its swift-falling 
brow, hidden from our sight by the 
slope of Moreh, is the Well of Harod. 
There Gideon tried his men to find who 
was brave, and thence he sent flying 
home through the glens the twenty and 
two thousand who were 'fearful and 
trembling.' Across the valley of Jez- 
reel northward on the slope of Moreh 
lay the hosts of Midian with their 

C27] 



ON NAZARETH HILL 



cattle and their tents, as locusts for 
multitude. Were there ever such odds ! 
The thousands of the children of the 
East against the three hundred of 
Gideon! But Gideon had seen the 
angel of Jehovah and had heard him 
say, 'God is with thee, thou mighty 
man of valor!' So with his lamps and 
his pitchers and his ram's horns down 
the valley he drove the hosts of Midian 
and he scattered kings 'as when it 
snoweth upon Zalmon.' Learn the 
lesson, son: God inspires one man, one 
man inspires three hundred, and three 
hundred put to flight the armies of 
the aliens! That is always God's 
way. 

C28] 



ON NAZARETH HILL 



"Very different was that other battle 
fought on the same field. In the last 
days of Saul came the Philistines once 
more to regain their supremacy over us. 
Not through the narrow defiles of Judah 
but here in this great valley they sought 
us, and they camped there like Midian 
on the southern slopes of Moreh, while 
Saul and his men gathered to battle 
like Gideon by the WeU. But Saul 
saw no angel: God had departed from 
him. Oh, the horror of that blackness 
may you never know, my boy, when 
man stretches out his feeble hands to 
God and finds him not! In his despair 
Saul that night passed down the slope, 
left the Philistine sentries far to the 

C29] 



ON NAZARETH HILL 



east, rounded Moreh, here, to this little 
village of Endor half way up its long 
northern slope. There the king who 
once had banished from the land all 
those who had familiar spirits now 
sought help of a sorceress to bring him 
the help of Samuel to bring him again 
one word from God! But there the 
witch read to him his fear and therein 
his doom; till the great king swooned 
before her, and rose with the morning 
to stagger back to his death. 
' Ye mountains of Gilboa, 

Let there be no dew nor rain upon you, 
neither fields of offerings: 

For there the shield of the mighty was 
cast away defiled, 

[3o] 



ON NAZARETH HILL 



The shield of Saul, as of one not 

anointed with oil. 
How are the mighty fallen, 
And the weapons of war perished!" 9 

" Father, why did God take his spirit 
from Saul?" 

" Samuel said it was because of 
Saul's disobedience in the matter of 
Amalek. 

1 To obey is better than sacrifice, 
And to harken than the fat of rams.' " 

"I asked mother the same question 
once and she quoted the same verse. 
Then she said that if Saul had not shut 
his heart against David, but had re- 
joiced in David's success and strength- 

[3i] 



ON NAZARETH HILL 



ened his throne by David's loyalty, 
God would have forgiven that one sin. 
And I have never forgotten how she 
looked at me when she said, 'Hatred 
towards others locks every door of the 
heart; love to others lets them in and 
God also.'" 

"I think your mother is right, son." 

1 HERE is Jezreel, father, perched on 
the nearest foothill of Gilboa! When 
we go past it on the way to Jerusalem, 
I wish we could go up there a little 
while." 

'You may if you like, for our first 
night's halt is by the spring of Jezreel. 
But why do you want to go there? " 

[32] 



ON NAZARETH HILL 



"I want to stand in Naboth's vine- 
yard, the place where the man of God 
met Ahab and dared to tell even the 
king that he had wronged a common 
man. Father, I should like to be a 
prophet!" 

"Perhaps God will give you a proph- 
et's work to do. There are surely 
wrongs enough to right, and wickedness 
in high places to rebuke. But there 
are prophets and prophets. I should 
not want you to be ' zealous for Jehovah' 
in the way Jehu was. He also met a 
king in Jezreel, you remember, in Na- 
both's vineyard, and slew him and his 
mother Jezebel, and caused the seventy 
sons of Ahab at Samaria to be slain, 

[33] 



ON NAZARETH HILL 



and all the worshipers of Baal. His 
'zeal for Jehovah, 5 of which he was so 
proud, brought Israel to its deepest pit 
of degradation; and Jehovah was no 
nearer the hearts of his people than 
before." 

" Mother says that she thinks God 
never spoke to Jehu, but he thought 
that his own ambition speaking to him 
was the voice of God. How does one 
know when God speaks, father?" 

"I don't know surely, my son. But 
I think if the voice urges us to do some- 
thing good, it is from above." 

1HERE is another village that we 
cannot see, lying just around the edge 

[34] 



ON NAZARETH HILL 



of Moreh, opposite Jezreel. Do you 
remember about it?" 

"Yes, that is Shunem. That is 
where the maiden lived who was true 
to her shepherd lover even when king 
Solomon wanted to marry her. That 
is the place also where the good woman 
prepared a little room over the gate for 
Elisha and made him welcome whenever 
he came." 

"And how did Elisha repay her?" 
"When her little boy died of a sun- 
stroke, Elisha brought him to his own 
chamber and prayed over the body, and 
God sent the child's life back again. 
That is a wonderful story! I think 
Elijah was noble when he rebuked king 

[35] 



ON NAZARETH HILL 



Ahab in Jezreel; but I think Elisha 
was beautiful when he gave the boy 
back to his mother. I wish — I wish 
I could be a prophet like Elisha!" 

L)0 you see this next village, lying here 
full on the face of Moreh? That is 
Nain. Nothing ever happened there. 
But a good woman lives there who once 
did me a kindness. She is now a widow 
and she has a son only a year old. My 
boy, if you ever have a chance, be good 
to her. 

HOW high and level the land runs 
beyond Jordan! It fills in the gaps to 
left and right of Moreh and stretches 
way to the south beyond Gilboa. That 

[36] 



ON NAZARETH HILL 



to the right of Moreh and Gilboa is 
Peraea, the Gilead of our fathers. It is 
the land through which Abraham came 
with his cattle on his way to Shechem. 
In the purple valley that makes down 
to Jordan just south of Gilboa flows 
the Jabbok, where Jacob fleeing from 
Laban and afraid to meet Esau, met 
God and wrestled for a blessing. We 
shall go through the borders of Peraea 
on our way to the Passover, through 
Bethabara and Pella to Jericho. There 
are many faithful Jews there, but the 
heathen are there too. 

"To the left of Moreh lies the region 
of Decapolis — the ten cities of the 
Greeks. You can see one of them there 

[3 7 ] 



ON NAZARETH HILL 



now, due east, hard by the nearer top 
of Tabor. That is Gadara, heathen 
Gadara. The building that gleams 
white in the sun is the temple of Jupiter ; 
the huge black building near it is the 
theater. My son, never enter a Greek 
city! The Greeks love what is beauti- 
ful rather than what is good. The 
Greeks love wine and song and the 
dance; they spend their time at the 
baths, at the play, at the games and 
the banquet and the house of the har- 
lot. They have lost the sense of sin, 
the passion for righteousness. They 
think they have found wisdom, but 
it is the wisdom of fools who fear not 
God. 

[38] 



ON NAZARETH HILL 



'My son, hear the instruction of thy 

father, 
And forsake not the law of thy mother. 
Enter not into the path of the wicked 
And walk not in the way of evil men. 

For the lips of the strange woman drop 

honey, 
And her mouth is smoother than oil: 
But in the end she is more bitter than 

wormwood, 
Sharp as a two-edged sword. 

Behold, the fear of Jehovah that is 
wisdom, 

And to depart from evil, that is under- 
standing." 9 

[3 9 ] 



ON NAZARETH HILL 



THERE is Tabor next, father ! What 
a fine round top it has, and how the 
oaks grow to the very summit! Barak 
couldn't have found a better place to 
collect his men; for there, hid among 
the trees, they could see the whole 
plain and watch every movement of 
Sisera. What is that tumble-down 
building on top? Is there anything in 
Scripture about it?" 

"Not in the sacred books. But in 
the book of Maccabees you will read 
how Antiochus of Syria came down 
about two hundred years ago to blot 
out our religion and force upon us the 
gods of the Greeks; how he fortified 

C4o] 



ON NAZARETH HILL 



Tabor and many other strong-holds. 
That ruin is his fortress. Those were 
the most terrible years that ever came 
to the chosen people. Listen to what 
the Psalm says of that fearful war: 
'0 God, the heathen have come into 

thine inheritance; 
Thy holy temple have they defiled; 
They have laid Jerusalem in heaps. 
The dead bodies of thy servants have 
they given to be food unto the birds of 
the heavens, 
The flesh of thy saints unto the beasts 

of the earth. 
Their blood have they shed like water 

round about Jerusalem, 
And there was none to bury them. 9 

C4i] 



ON NAZARETH HILL 



But God raised us up a deliverer, even 
like Gideon; and gave us a king even 
like David; and once more the smoke 
of daily sacrifice rose from the temple 
courts. But lust of power came in to 
steal our rulers' hearts away from God, 
— and after that, the Roman. 

THERE to the north of Tabor, son, 
is the hollow in which the sea of Gen- 
nesaret lies; beyond the gulf, Bashan; 
and there to the north-east, glorious 
Hermon, its head streaming with snow! 
People sometimes call the mountain 
'the Old Man, 9 but I like to think of 
it differently. When the clouds gather 
round it and hide it from sight, I think 

[42] 



ON NAZARETH HILL 



of Jehovah who dwelleth in thick dark- 
ness: 'Clouds and darkness are round 
about him.' And when the wind scat- 
ters the clouds, and the glory of the 
snow rises up into the glory of the 
blue, I think of that great white throne 
whose foundations are justice and judg- 
ment. 

' Thy throne, God, is forever and ever; 

A scepter of righteousness is the scepter 
of thy kingdom' " 

"Oh, father, see little Gath Hephor 
on its nob of a hill so close to us. Was 
Jonah really born there?" 

"The people in the village say so. 
They are very proud to show his tomb 
there under the tree." 

[43] 



ON NAZARETH HILL 



"Mother says that when I was not 
four years old, at bedtime I used always 
to say, ' Mamma, tell me about Jonah! ' 
I suppose it was his running away, and 
the storm, and the great fish, and the 
gourd that I liked. Do you remember 
when we went to Capernaum last fall 
to build that shed for Zebedee? He 
took me out one night on the lake with 
the fishermen and we had a big storm. 
When the squall came up and every- 
body thought that the boat was going 
to capsize, the heathen fishermen began 
to pray to all sorts of gods. One Greek 
boy kneeled down in the bottom of the 
boat in a foot of water and vowed that 
if he got home safely he would make a 

[44] 



ON NAZARETH HILL 



pilgrimage to Tiberias and give his 
best knife to Apheia the Fish-goddess 
there. That's the way the sailors in 
Jonah's boat did." 

"Did you pray too, son?" 

"I don't remember that I did. But 
I remember thinking what a wonderful 
thing a storm is, and how the wind is 
God's messenger; and I felt warm in 
my heart to think that God was so near. 
Father, do you think that God will ever 
save the heathen?" 

" I don't think so. Why do you ask? " 

" Well, it says in Jonah that when the 
heathen sailors prayed to Jehovah, he 
stilled the waves; and when Jonah 
preached to Nineveh the people re- 

[45] 



ON NAZARETH HILL 



pented; and when God blamed Jonah 
for getting angry over the gourd he said, 
'And should I not have regard for 
Nineveh, that great city, wherein are 
more than six score thousand persons 
that cannot discern between their right 
hand and their left? ' Mother says that 
just as nobody can run away from God, 
so no one can get beyond his love; but 
the Rabbi at the synagogue says that 
mother better read Joshua if she wants 
to know what God thinks of the 
heathen!" 

4 'These things are hard to under- 
stand." 

"I think, father, that I love Jonah 
better than any one in the Scripture." 

C46J 



ON NAZARETH HILL 



"That is strange; why should you?" 
"Do you remember that in the storm 
he confessed that he was the guilty one, 
and begged the sailors to let him die in 
their stead; and when God saved him 
from that fate, he went to Nineveh and 
saved that whole great city from de- 
struction? The other prophets are 
always condemning the heathen, but 
Jonah saved more heathen than all the 
other prophets put together." 

"I never thought of it that way be- 
fore. What a queer laddie you are! 

WE have almost completed the circle! 
Behind our hill, in the long valley be- 
tween us and Upper Galilee lies the 

[4 7 ] 



ON NAZARETH HILL 



'Way of the Sea.' Here and there you 
get glimpses of the road between the 
hills. It comes from Damascus, be- 
yond Hermon, and from Babylon and 
Nineveh where our fathers languished; 
the Way of Despair one might almost 
call it, for at one end of it lies Exile 
and at the other Slavery. This is only 
a branch that makes straight to the 
sea from Capernaum. Another branch 
goes between us and Tabor and crosses 
the plain to Megiddo. Another runs 
along the heights beyond Gennesaret, 
then descends to the Jordan at Betha- 
bara, mounts again to Gilboa and 
passes by Dothan down to Egypt. All 

day these roads are busy with traffic. 

[48] 



ON NAZARETH HILL 



Look southward once more to the great 
plain — do you see that line of black 
specks moving against the green fields? 
— merchants from the East with their 
silks and their spices and their goodly 
pearls? Turn again now to this north- 
ern road. See the company of horse- 
men spurring out from behind Sepphoris ! 
The sun gleams from their helmets and 
flashes from their shields. And the 
litter in the midst, with the banners, 
carries no doubt some ambassador from 
Rome, or some new governor for a city 
of the Decapolis, or some favorite of 
the Emperor coming to take the cure 
at the hot baths of Tiberias or Gadara. 
If one wishes to see all the kingdoms 

[4 9 ] 



ON NAZARETH HILL 



of the world and the glory of them one 
has only to stand for a day on this 
watch-tower! 

" Ah, look, son! There's a sad sight. 
Coming down the path from little Gath 
Hephor do you see the man on the white 
horse, and the two other horsemen? 
I know that little group. Good old 
Ezra ben Joaz told me only last week 
about the restlessness of his youngest 
boy. He had seen the Gentiles daily 
pass his village on their journeys, heard 
the rumors of great cities with their 
games and their pageants, their luxury 
and their power; and he begged his 
father to give him now his portion and 
let him see the world. He is headed 

[5o] 



ON NAZARETH HILL 



now for the far country. He will see 
Antioch and Ephesus and Rome; and 
when he has spent all he will come back 
again to his father's house!" 

"But do you think his father will 
take him back again when he has once 
chosen to go away, and has spent in 
wickedness all his living?" 

" Take him back ! Will not old Ezra's 
heart go with him into every city, and 
suffer with him in every sin, and pray 
night and day for God to turn home 
again the young man's foolish feet? 
Ah! son, never till you have a boy of 
your own will you know the infinite 
longing and the infinite forgiveness of 
a father's heart!" 

[5i] 



ON NAZARETH HILL 



" Father, — is God — like you? " 
"Don't, dear boy!" 

AND so we come to the sea, that great 
deep that our people do not love and 
never understood, — unfathomable as 
the judgments of God. We only know 
that out of it have come the floods of 
an alien faith and a cruel despotism — 
that beyond it are Greece and Rome. 
There at the end of the road beyond the 
last hill is Ptolemais, whither their 
galleys flock. There in the harbor al- 
most beneath the sun are the triremes 
and the merchantmen, like black spear- 
wounds on a shield of gold. They are 
the symbols of our slavery, and of the 

[52] 



ON NAZARETH HILL 



wealth and luxury and pomp of the 
world after which the Gentiles seek, 
and after which, alas! the hearts of 
God's people are lusting till it seems as 
if Mammon would again drive Jehovah 
from his temple! — And in the galleys 
come the legions with their eagles to 
feed even on our poverty and to awe 
into silence the last whisper of hope. 
Lord, when wilt thou speak comfort- 
ably to Jerusalem and cry unto her that 
her warfare is accomplished, her ini- 
quity is pardoned? Yet we will not 
despair: 
'Behold, a king shall reign in righteous- 
ness, and princes shall rule in justice. 
And a man shall be a hiding-place from 

[53] 



ON NAZARETH HILL 



the wind, and a covert from the tempest, 
as streams of water in a dry place, as 
the shadow of a great rock in a weary 
land. . . . And there shall come forth 
a shoot out of the stock of Jesse, and a 
branch out of his roots shall bear fruit. 
And the spirit of Jehovah shall rest 
upon him. . . . With righteousness 
shall he judge the poor, and decide 
with equity for the meek of the earth. 
. . . Of the increase of his govern- 
ment and of peace there shall be 
no end.' 

' 'The sun has touched the sea. The 
shadow of Carmel has crept across the 
plain even to Jezreel. The great ruby 
cloud that hangs above Gilead has 

[54] 



ON NAZARETH HILL 



turned almost to ashes. Let us go 
down ; for mother is waiting for us there 
by the spring — do you see her with the 
black water-jar? But tell me this, my 
boy, before we go. When God's own 
time has come, and you hear the voice 
that in your heart you know is His — 
calling as it called Gideon and Elisha 
and Barak and the host of others who 
have wrought valiantly for Him — 
calling it matters not to what service 
or what sacrifice, will you listen? will 
you follow?" 



[55] 



KEY TO THE MAP 

Nazareth (center of radiating lines), pp. 1-2, 58, 60. 

1. ML Carmel: pp. 2, 62. Elijah and Baal, 1 Kings 18 : i-45. 

2. Megiddo: pp. 12, 70-72. Death of Josiah, 2 Chron. 35 : 20-27. 

3. Taanach: p. i4- Deborah and Barak, Judges 4-5. 

4. Esdraelon and River Kishon: p. 68. Jacob's description, Gen. 

49 : i4~i5. Deborah and Barak, Judges 4-5. 

5. Dothan: pp. 20, 74. Joseph sold, Gen. 37 : 12-36. Elisha escapes, 

2 Bangs 6 : 8-23. 

6. Samaria: pp. 23, 76, 78. Omri makes capital, 1 Kings 16 : 23, 

24, 28. Ahab builds Baal temple, 1 Kings 16 : 29-33. Be- 
sieged by Benhadad, 1 Kings 20; 2 Kings 6 : 24-chap. 7. 
Elijah and the messengers, 2 Kings 1. Jehu captures, 2 
Kings 10 : 1-28. Assyrians capture, 2 Kings 17 : 1-6. 

7. Ebal-Gerizim and vicinity: pp. 25, 80. Blessing and cursing, 

Josh. 8 : 3o-35. Abraham sojourns, Gen. 12 : 1-7. Jacob's 
experiences, Gen. 33 : i8-35 : 4- Abimelech's career, Jud. 9. 
Rehoboam and Jeroboam, 1 Kings 12 : i-33; i3. Christ 
and the Samaritan woman, John 4 '• 5-42. Joseph's tomb, 
Josh. 24 : 32. 

8. ML Gilboa: pp. 27, 84. Death of Saul and Jonathan, 1 Sam. 

3i. 2 Sam. 1 : 1-27. 

9. Gideon s Fountain: pp. 27, 86. Gideon's victory, Judges 7. 

10. Jezreel: pp. 32, 32. Naboth's vineyard, 1 Kings 21. Jehu's 

vengeance, 2 Kings 9. 

11. Shunem: pp. 35, 84- Birthplace of Abishag, 1 Kings 1 : i-4. 

Elisha and the Shunammite, 2 Kings 4 '• 8-37. See also Song 
of Songs. 

12. Nain: pp. 36, 88. Widow's son raised, Luke 7 : 11-17. 
i3. Little Hermon, or Moreh: pp. 35, 84- 

i4- Endor: p. 3o. Saul consults witch, 1 Sam : 28. 

1 5. Gadara: pp. 38, 90. 

16. ML Tabor: pp. 4o, 88. Place of refuge, Jud. 4:6, 12. Poetical 

references, Jer. 46 : 18; Ps. 89 : 12. 

17. Sea of Gennesaret {Galilee): pp. 42, 90, 92. 

18. ML Hermon: p. 42. Transfiguration, Mk. 9 : 2-i3; Lk. 9 : 28- 

36. Healing of epileptic, Mk. 9 : 14-29. 

19. Gath Hephor: p. 43. 

20. Way of the Sea: pp. 48, 94- 

21. Sepphoris: pp. 4i, 49, 96. 

22. Plolemais: pp. 52, 98. Jesus cures girl, Mk. 7 : 24-3o. Paul 

lands, Acts 21 : 7. 



© 



ESDRAELON 

— AND — 

LOWER GALILEE 




KEY TO THE MAP 

Nazareth (center of radiating lines), pp. 1-2, 58, 60. 

. ML Carmel: pp. 2, 62. Elijah and Baal, 1 Kings 18 : i-45 
. Megiddo: pp. I2 , 70-72. Death of Josiah, 2 Chron. 35 : 20^27 
. Taanach: p. 14. Deborah and Barak, Judges 4-5. 
. Esdraelon and River Kishon: p. 68. Jacob's description, Gen. 

49 : i4-i5. Deborah und Barak, Judges 4-5. 
' ^Ki n 's6 2 t 7 i' Jos eph sold, Gen. 3 7 : 12-36. Elisha escapes, 
. Samaria: pp. 2 3, 76 .,78. Omri makes capital, 1 Kings 16 : a3, 

24,28 Ahab builds Bad temple, 1 Kings i(i : 20 -33. Be- 

m,v,,I l,y Benhadad, 1 Kings 20; 2 Kings f. : 24-chap. 7. 
•Jil.'h and the messengers, 2 Kings 1. Jehu captures ■ 

Kings 10:1-28. Assyrians capture, 2 Kings 17:1-6. 
. Ebal-Gerizim and vicinity: pp. 2 5, 80. Blessing and cursing, 

Josh. 8 : 3o-35. Abraham sojourns, (Jen. n : 1-7 Jacob's 

experiences. Gen. 33 : i8-35 : 4- Abimelech's career, Jud. 9. 

Uehoboam and Jeroboam, 1 Kings 12: i-33; i.'i. Christ, 

and the Samaritan woman, John 4 : 5-42. Joseph's h 

Josh. 24 : 32. 
. Ml. Gilboa: pp. 27, 84. Death of Saul and Jonathan, 1 Sam. 

3i. 2 Sam. 1 : 1-27. 
. Gideons Fountain: pp. 27, 86. Gideon's victory, Judges 7. 
. Jezreel: pp. 32, 32. Naboth's vineyard, 1 Kings 21. Jehu's 

vengeance, 2 Kings 9. 
. Shunem: pp. 35, 84. Birthplace of Abishag, 1 Kings 1 : i-4. 

Elisha and the Shunammite, 2 Kings 4 : 8-37. See also Sou,; 

of Songs. 
. Nain: pp. 36, 88. Widow's son raised, Luke 7: n-17. 
. Little Hernion, or Moreh: pp. 35, 84. 
. Endor: p. 3o. Saul consults witch, 1 Sam : 28. 
. Gadara: pp. 38, 90. 
. Ml. Tabor: pp. 4o, 88. Place of refuge, Jud. 4 : 6, 12. Poetical 

references, Jer. 46 : 18; Ps. 89 : 12. 
. Sea of Gennesarel (Galilee) : pp. 42, 90, 92. 
. Ml. Hernton: p. 42. Transfiguration, Mk. 9:2-13; Lk. 9 : 28- 

36. Healing of epileptic, Mk. 9 : 14-29. 
. Galh llephor: p. 43. 
. Way of the Sea: pp. 48, 9 4- 
. Sepphoris: pp. 4i, 49. 9°- 
. Plolemais: pp. 52, 98. Jesus cures girl, Mk. 7 : 24-3o. Paul 

lands, Acts 21 : 7. 



ILLUSTRATIONS 

J_ HE reader who desires to reconstruct 
the backgrounds of this story should 
study carefully the pictures here ap- 
pended. Naturally the view-point of 
the pictures cannot always be Nazareth 
Hill, for the distances render the ordi- 
nary camera ineffective. But the posi- 
tion of Nazareth with reference to each 
picture is usually indicated. 

The writer suggests that the entire story 
should be read first, the map and pic- 
tures should be examined next, and 
lastly the story should be re-read, with 
a reference to the map and pictures at 
the beginning of each division of the 
story. 



[5 7 ] 



VIEW SOUTH FROM NAZARETH HILL 



N< 



I O camera can ever do justice to this view. It may 
catch the unimportant details of the village at our feet, 
but the magic of the broad plain quite eludes it, and the 
Samaritan hills, so sharp to the natural eye, fuse with 
the sky and the plain in a mist of vagueness. Yet this 
picture hints at the facts: the hollow bowl in which 
Nazareth lies, the southern rim where the details of 
the picture suddenly cease, the veiled plain that runs 
level for fifteen miles to Jenin and Megiddo. The 
highest point of the vague sky-line, to the right of the 
center, is Ebal-Gerizim; Gilboa and Little Hermon are 
out of sight to the left, Carmel to the right. Carry the 
horizon clear round the circle and you have precisely 
the limits of our story. 

On these hills the boy Jesus played. He saw the 
white mists of dawn rise from their beds in the hollows 
of Esdraelon or in the more distant gulf of Jordan, grow 
golden in the early sun and hasten away. He saw 
"Jehovah march from Seir " in the great thunder-clouds 
that pile up miles high over Moab, or descend like a 
flood upon the mud-houses till they dissolve into the 
sand. He considered the lilies of the field that blazon 
these hills every spring with thrice the glories of Solo- 
mon and then with the siroccos of May become fit only 
to cast into the oven. From these hills he watched the 
deluge of the summer heat as it floods the plain and 
causes the very mountains to quiver and take refuge 
in pools of aerial water. He learned to discern the face 
of the sky, to read the meaning of the red and lowering 
sun, to watch the eagles gather together over the worn- 
out caravan-camel by the wayside. From these hills 
his eye followed the merchants pursuing their dreams 
of wealth along the white roads that thread the land- 
scape. He saw the sower go forth to sow in the ruddy 
plain; he saw the many-colored reapers return at 
night, bringing their sheaves with them; he saw the 
yellow smoke puff up from a hundred threshing-floors 
and scatter away to leeward. And most marvelous 
of all, he managed to link the thought of God for all 
time with these simple elements of his boyhood experi- 
ence. His pure heart saw God in everything. 

[58] 




Stereograph copyrighted by Underwood ey Underwood, N. Y. 
VIEW SOUTH FROM NAZARETH HILL 



NAZARETH LOOKING EAST 

J- HIS picture shows how Nazareth lies in a hollow. A 
ring of low hill-tops quite surrounds the town so that 
one must always climb to look over. The height to the 
left is the view-point for our story. The large building 
on the slope is an English mission school for girls. The 
English protestant church is in the left foreground; 
the dome of the Greek church that marks the traditional 
site of the synagogue in which Jesus preached may be 
seen over the next building to the right; and a Muslim 
minaret rises among the cypress trees to the right of 
the dome. The Roman Catholic Church of the Annun- 
ciation is out of sight on the right. These buildings give 
a hint of the religious divisions of the city. Of the 
714.7 inhabitants, 277/i are Greek Christians, i557 are 
Mohammedans, 11 89 are Roman Catholics, 3o2 are 
Protestants and 1294 are scattering. 

Most of the houses in the picture are modern. The 
ancient village lay rather to the rear of the present one. 
There are no authentic sites connected with the life of 
Jesus. Crusading and Ryzantine churches were located 
for pious rather than for archaeological reasons. Yet 
located they were, as soon as the arm of a Christian 
emperor shielded the Christian from Jewish hatred. 
The first basilica was built at Nazareth before 336 a.d., 
probably at Constantine's order, by Joseph, Count of 
Tiberias. From this building some monoliths of red 
granite and some considerable areas of mosaic pavement 
still survive in the church of the Annunciation. The 
crusaders under Tancred (1100) found this church in 
ruins, but rebuilt it. Recent excavations are bringing 
much of this second building to light. In it wor- 
shiped St. Francis of Assisi (12 19) and St. Louis of 
France (i254). Less than ten years later, Reibars of 
Egypt encamped with his army on Tabor and sent a 
detachment to destroy all churches and massacre all 
Christians. The Franciscans returned within sixty 
years and with varying success have held the town for 
Christianity ever since. Napoleon lodged here in 1799; 
it was for him his farthest East and his first Waterloo. 



[60] 




Photo by S. U. Mitman, Ph.D. 

NAZARETH, LOOKING EAST 



Y< 



THE PLACE OF SACRIFICE 



OU are now on the oak-dotted slopes of lower Gal- 
ilee and are looking due south at the Place of Sacrifice 
— the little knob under the cross. Nazareth is fifteen 
miles to your left; Haifa is nine miles to your right. 
In the valley between you and Carmel flows the Kishon. 
The white Carmelite shrine on this south-east 
haunch of Carmel is one of the most conspicuous ob- 
jects in a wide landscape, and the view from the 
building is correspondingly grand. Your eye sweeps 
the whole horizon of upper Galilee to towering Hermon, 
leaps the Jordan to the high level sky-line of the Hau- 
ran and the Decapolis, follows the billowy mountain 
contours of Samaria, and loses definite vision far to the 
south in the violet haze that hovers over Sharon. Es- 
draelon, with all its scenes and its memories, rolls out 
like a magic carpet at your feet. "Heavenly" is the 
only way to describe the long morning the writer spent 
on the roof of this little shrine — heavenly the cobalt of 
the sky, heavenly the fresh breeze from the coasts 
of Tyre and Sidon, heavenly the ever-shifting pattern 
of color woven by the cloud-shadows on the gorgeous 
loom of the plain. The spirit of Elijah is surely near. 
There below is the road from Jezreel up which drove 
Ahab and his priests to the contest. Around us the 
rocks are dense with witnesses. We hear the shouts 
of prayer that batter at Baal's gates; we see the blood 
flow. There is the spring from which Elijah draws his 
water. The fire of Jehovah falls ! The frenzied people 
rush upon the vanquished and drive them down the 
precipitous slope beneath us to the silver thread of 
Kishon. And there to the north-west is the rounded 
summit of Carmel up which the servant runs to behold 
the sea and the "cloud no bigger than a man's hand." 



[62] 




Photo by S. U. Mitman, Ph.D. 

THE PLACE OF SACRIFICE 



s 



MARY'S FOUNTAIN, NAZARETH 



OMEWHERE within a mile of every village in 
Palestine is a spring to which a well-worn path leads. 
Night and morning, and as often as necessary in be- 
tween, the women and girls of the household walk to 
the spring and return with their heavy water-jars 
balanced jauntily on their heads. A mile walk under 
these conditions would tax the strength of even an 
American woman! 

It was to such a spring in Nazareth that Mary came 
daily. Since Nazareth has only one spring, there is no 
doubt of its authenticity. The only question is whether 
in Mary's day the water was taken at the spring itself 
or at some conveniently arranged spout or trough at 
some distance from the spring. At the present day the 
latter method is used. This picture shows the place 
where for centuries the women and children have filled 
their jars. There is a platform, approached from the 
road by a couple of stone steps ; a shallow arch of stone, 
under which is an ancient sarcophagus that serves as a 
trough. Into it the water pours from three taps. 
Behind the wall is a reservoir. A stone conduit brings 
the water from the true source about a hundred yards 
nearer the hill. That spring is now covered by a Greek 
church. It seems probable that Mary took her water 
from the spring rather than from the predecessor of 
this structure; for the pilgrim Saewulf in no3 speaks 
of columns and tablets of marble that garnished the 
fountain of Mary. On that spot in the twelfth cent- 
ury the Greeks built a church, the successor to which, 
the church of St. Gabriel, now stands over the spring. 
It was there, according to the apocryphal gospel of 
St. James the Less, that the annunciation took place. 

The point of view for our story is at an angle of forty- 
five degrees to the left of this picture. You can see 
part of the hill in the background. 



[64] 




Photo by S. U. Mitman, Ph.D. 

MARY'S FOUNTAIN, NAZARETH 



MOUNT CARMEL AND THE PLAIN OF ACRE 



E s 



ESSENTIALLY this view, reduced by distance, may 
be seen from Nazareth. Down these oak-spotted slopes 
of the lower Galilean hills winds the road to Haifa. 
You can discover a caravan there on the right. In the 
center of the picture is little Harosheth, strategic base 
for the army of Sisera. Hiding here behind the lower 
Galilean hills, it could not be discovered by Barak who 
was mustering on Tabor. Not till Sisera had passed 
through the narrow defile to the left of the picture, 
where the Kishon breaks through between the hills and 
Carmel, did Barak thunder down from his aerie and cut 
him to pieces. 

As one looks south-west from Nazareth the rippling 
back of Carmel forms the sky-line for nearly forty-five 
degrees. From the present view-point the ripples are 
seen to be a succession of half-amalgamated hills that 
stretch almost to the horizon and then make a bold leap 
into the sea. Just where they vanish stands Haifa. 
On the promontory of Carmel that overhangs the sea 
is the monastery where the order of the Carmelites was 
founded about n56 a.d. From that sightly place one 
may see on the south (our left) the ruins of Athlit, a 
Crusaders' port of entry; and on the north (our right) 
St. John of Acre and the steep cliffs known as the 
Ladder of Tyre. Below the monastery is a cave in 
which Elijah is said to have lived, and another where 
the woman from Shunem besought Elisha to restore 
her son. In the monastery yard is the grave of two 
thousand of Napoleon's soldiers who were left behind 
sick in the hurried retreat from Acre and were massa- 
cred by the Turks. As everywhere in the world, sacred 
places in Palestine are the bloodiest. 



[66] 




Photo by S. U. Mitman, Ph.D 

MOUNT CARMEL AND THE PLAIN OF ACRE 



MOUNT CARMEL AND THE KISHON 



i 



N this picture you are standing on the last bastion of 
the Galilean hills and looking south across the valley 
to the glens of Mt. Carmel. To your left is Esdraelon; 
to your right the plain of Acre. To the right also, eight 
miles distant, are Haifa and the magnificent bay of Acre 
on the north promontory of which stands the Roman 
city of Ptolemais — the Acre of the Crusaders. Follow- 
ing the sky-line of Carmel to the left a couple of miles, 
you come to the crest where Elijah built his altar. 
This part of the Kishon is traditionally the spot where 
he put to death the prophets of Baal. 

This grand old hill has been sacred from prehistoric 
times, doubtless because, "standing at the gateway of 
the rains" and abounding in springs, it is green when 
the rest of the land is parched. The Phoenicians 
peopled it with Baals, whom the Hebrews still found 
doing business, till Elijah overthrew them for a time. 
After Jehovah came Zeus, who was supplanted in turn 
by the deified mountain itself. The Arabs substituted 
Elijah under the name of the Verdant or the Living One. 
The Crusaders covered the mountain with chapels, and 
today the sanctity of the range is perpetuated by 
Druses, Jews, Christians and Muslims. 

The sluggish stream of Kishon rises in the amphi- 
theater of plain behind Mt. Gilboa, and after a tortuous 
course pushes through this narrow defile. Innocent- 
looking though it is, Kishon has power in the rainy 
season to transform the whole plain into a morass. 
Hence the description of the rout of Sisera's chariotry 
when Jehovah marched from Edom and the heavens 
dropped down. Horses cannot fight or run away in a 
bog. 



IS$1 




Stereograph copyrighted by Underwood & Underwood, N. Y. 
MOUNT CARMEL AND THE KISHON 



Y, 



TELL MEGIDDO 



OU are standing on the plain of Esdraelon and 
looking north-west. Nazareth is ninety degrees to the 
right. The hill before you is a characteristically-shaped 
artificial mound such as usually indicates in Palestine 
the site of a buried city. It is Megiddo. 

Our nearness to it makes it hide the back of Carmel, 
which starting in a bold crest just to the left of our 
picture foreshortens itself in a wavy descent to the sea 
twenty miles straight in front of us. Sharp to the left 
is the sword-cut in the hi Is known as the Pass of 
Megiddo, the exit or entrance for all the conquerors 
of the East from Sargon of Agade, 3700 b.c. (?) to Napo- 
leon and Ibrahim Pasha. Thothmes III of Egypt 
records having taken this town after defeating on the 
plain the confederated kings of Palestine. Solomon 
fortified Megiddo. According to 2 Kings 9:27, Ahaziah 
died here. Barak fought Sisera here. Here Pharaoh 
Necho killed Josiah; and the city has been immor- 
talized as Armageddon, where according to Rev. 16:16 
the final battle between good and evil will occur. 



[70] 



:m&zmMSm^ 




Stereograph copyrighed by Underwood eJ Underwood, N. Y. 
TELL MEGIDDO 



Y< 



THE RUINS OF MEGIDDO 



OU are looking north. Nazareth is ju t off the pic- 
ture to the right, perched on the first range of hills. 
This hill of Megiddo was excavated in 1902 by a German 
society. The workmen discovered the remains of sev- 
eral superimposed cities built at six or seven different 
periods, as is attested by several characteristic buildings 
and "finds. " The ruins of a fortress with a brick ram- 
part twenty-eight feet thick date back probably to 3ooo 
B.C. Babylonian influence is shown by the discovery 
of cuneiform tablets, gems and cylinder seals. Egyp- 
tian civilization is evidenced also, besides Canaanitish, 
Assyrian and Jewish. The oldest known Hebrew seal 
was found here, once the property of a high officer of 
Jeroboam II. 

Note in the picture how the small house-walls 
are huddled together with hardly a trace of streets. 
Ancient Palestinian cities were as densely populated as 
rabbit-warrens. They were merely the huts of an agri- 
cultural people who cultivated the surrounding plains 
or hills and repaired to the fortress at night or in time 
of danger. They were little affairs about the size of 
the Charlestown navy-yard. Joshua, you recall, could 
march his whole army round Jericho before breakfast 
and repeat the performance six times in the day without 
tiring his men. Jerusalem itself in the time of the great 
Solomon covered not over a quarter of a square mile — 
a circumstance that shows how "great" Solomon must 
have been when compared with the mighty potentates 
of Thebes and Babylon. Palestine has always been a 
back- woods country spattered over with petty kinglets 
in microscopic capitals. The "King of Megiddo" 
would not make much of a show beside the Mayor of 
Oshkosh or the Boss of a down-town ward! 



[72] 




Stereograph copyrighted by Underwood & Underwood, N. Y. 
THE RUINS OF MEGIDDO 



L, 



THE PLAIN OF DOTHAN 



J IKE practically all the cities of Palestine, Dothan was 
built on a hill. It guarded the through caravan route 
from Damascus and the East to the plain of Sharon and 
Egypt on the south-west. This picture shows you the 
wretched village that has succeeded the ancient city, 
the plain with the caravan trail, and the hills which 
separate this amphitheater of fields from the long lit- 
toral of Sharon. Continuing to the right (north) the 
hills roll gently up to Carmel with only one serious 
break at Megiddo; to the left (south) they roll towards 
the ridges of Samaria, and culminate in Ebal. Through 
the valley from right to left drew the caravan of Ishmael- 
ites who purchased Joseph to sell in the slave-market 
of Avaris. In this valley the Syrians made a ring of 
horsemen about the hill on which we are standing, 
while on the encircing hills descended the horses and 
chariots of fire. 

No one can ride through the plain of Dothan without 
a thrill as he realizes that he is treading one of the most 
ancient highways known to man. Long before our 
country was dreamed of, the Crusaders filed down this 
valley, as a millennium earlier the Roman eagles had 
glittered along the trail. Behind Rome flash the bronze 
phalanxes of Alexander, and further still the hosts 
stretch back through the centuries, — 4oo years to 
Sargon II of Assyria, 800 more to Thutmose III of 
Egypt, 700 more to Hammurabi of Babylon, i^oo more 
to Sargon I of Agade, till the march of the generations 
vanishes over the horizon of history. Between these 
tides of war for six thousand years have flowed the 
steadier currents of traffic, merchant trains lured by 
the two great empires in the two great river-valleys of 
antiquity. Dothan is a gateway on a high road of the 
nations. 



[74] 



JM» 




Stereograph copyrighted by Underwood & Underwood, N. Y. 
THE PLAIN OF DOTHAN 



s, 



THE HILL OF SAMARIA 



*AMARIA is not visible from Nazareth, but its 
position is clearly indicated by a saddle in the hills 
near the western end of the Ebal-Gerizim sky-line. 

It was founded about 875 B.C. by Omri, who bought 
the hill for military reasons and named it Shomeron 
(watch-tower), whence the word Samaria. It stands 
i454 feet above the Mediterranean, three to four hun- 
dred feet above the plain which surrounds it on all sides. 
The prophet Isaiah saw in it a symbol of the beauty 
and weakness of northern Israel, — "the proud coronet 
of the drunkards of Ephraim. " Notice the luxuriant 
olive groves in the picture. 

Omri built walls and a palace. Ahab built an ' ' ivory 
house" for himself and Jezebel, and a Baal temple, 
which Jehu destroyed. Twice it was besieged by Ben- 
hadad I of Syria. Elisha had a home here. It at- 
tained its full tide of prosperity under Jeroboam II, 
and was conquered and destroyed by Sargon II in 722 
B.C. after a three-year siege. The city seems to have 
been rebuilt under Greek rule, for John Hyrcanus de- 
stroyed it again in 129 B.C. Rebuilt by Herod about 
25 B.C., it flourished till the rise of Nablous in the 
4th century a.d. caused its decline. According to 
Jerome it was the burying-place of Elisha, Obadiah and 
John the Baptist, whose tombs were shown to pilgrims 
in the middle ages. Over the tomb of John the Cru- 
saders built a magnificent church, which still stands and 
serves as a mosque. Its minaret occupies the center of 
the sky-line in this picture, and the little village it 
serves crouches like a beggar amid the ruined splendors 
of the past. 

The colonnade of Herod runs to the left, from the 
village, and leads beneath the slopes of the Acropolis to 
the west gate — doubtless the gate outside of which 
the lepers found the abandoned camp of the Syrians. 



[76] 




Stereograph copyrighted by Underwood & Underwood, N. Y. 
THE HILL OF SAMARIA 



A, 



HEROD'S COLONNADE 



l-BOUT 25 b.c, after the battle of Actium, the city of 
Samaria was given to Herod by Augustus, in return for 
his friendship. Herod rebuilt it magnificently and 
renamed it after the emperor's wife Augusta (Greek, 
Sebaste) . It was two and a half miles in circumference. 
The ruins of its strong walls and towers are still visible. 
The Acropolis occupied the highest crest and contained 
the palaces and the temple to the divine Augustus. 
This section was surrounded by a broad terrace adorned 
with a colonnade one and a half miles long. The pic- 
ture shows a few of the monoliths that still stand, a 
third of their sixteen feet buried in the accumulations 
of the centuries. There were four rows of these columns 
with a driveway down the center. Under their shadow 
were booths and shops for traders; for owing to its 
nearness and accessibility to the sea at Csesarea, 
Sebaste was destined to be a commercial city. On this 
terrace also was the magnificent law-court (Basilica); 
and lower down, in the natural bays of the north slope 
of the hill, were a theater and a stadium. The city was 
colonized by six thousand of Herod's veterans and was 
purely Graeco-Roman in spirit and life. For this reason 
it is probable that Jesus never entered it, though on 
his way to and from Jerusalem he doubtless saw it. 

In 1908 Harvard University excavated part of the 
site. They found Herod's temple to Augustus with its 
altar and statue; under it the palaces of Omri and Ahab, 
with evidences of rebuilding by Jehu and Rehoboam II. 
Most interesting were the "ostraca," or pottery tags 
for wine and oil jars: they were written in the most 
ancient Hebrew script known, about 700 b.c. 



[78] 




Photo by S. U. Mitman, Ph.D. 

HEROD'S COLONNADE 



Y, 



JACOB'S ^YELL AND MOUNT EBAL 



OU are standing in the plain of Muknah looking 
north. The mountain is Ebal. A quarter of a mile to 
the left of the picture you enter the jaws of the defile 
between Ebal and Gerizim. In these jaws occurred the 
antiphonal recital of the Blessings and the Cursings by 
the tribes of Israel, — an easily possible feat, as the 
writer has personally demonstrated. Up that cleft 
lies old Shunem (modern Nablous), whose turbulent 
inhabitants proved no match for the wiles of Jacob, 
but who later gave Jotham a close call and furnished 
Abimelech with the "sons of Belial" necessary to his 
ambition. 

More vital than these unedifying episodes of the 
Old Testament is the story of Jesus at the well. All 
the elements of that narrative are here. The square 
spot on Ebal's base is Sychar. Within the walled en- 
closure is the well itself. This is certainly the well on 
whose curb Jesus sat while on his way home from 
Jerusalem, and these are the fields that caught his eye 
when he said, "The fields are white already with the 
harvest." It is inspiring to the tradition-ridden tra- 
veler to come at last upon a spot where he may say, 
"Jesus was assuredly here! " 

Nazareth lies directly through the mountain, thirty 
miles away. Since Ebal is the highest point on the 
horizon as one looks south from Nazareth, the location 
of Jacob's well is easily determined even from that 
distance. 



[80] 




Photo by S. U. Mitman, Ph.D. 

JACOB'S WELL AND MOUNT EBAL 



Y< 



RUINS AT JACOB'S WELL 



OU are standing within the walled enclosure looking 
nearly north-east. Over the hill the high land of Sama- 
ria sinks rapidly and roughly to the Jordan valley. 

The ruins belong to a beautiful church built by the 
crusaders and destroyed by Saladin in 1187 a.d It 
was preceded by a series of churches built by the pious 
of earlier centuries, and is now being replaced by another 
built exactly on the lines of the crusading edifice. In 
the construction are being used some beautiful mono- 
lithic columns of Egyptian red granite which undoubtedy 
have survived from the earliest Christian basilica. 

In a crypt of solid masonry is the well, now curbed 
with a block of stone that is sawed deeply by the ropes 
of the generations. This may have been and probably 
is the very stone on which Jesus sat when he talked with 
the woman of Samaria. As we stand here and look 
down into the shaft, we seem to hear, "Sir, thou hast 
nothing to draw with and the well is deep." Looking 
up the stairway of the crypt, beyond the rising church 
walls, we see the rugged top of old Gerizim, crowned 
with the shapeless ruins of saints' tombs, temples, 
churches, and fortresses, mute witness to the struggles 
through which the Samaritans have maintained their 
worship to this day. We are standing on holy ground. 
This well is a landmark in the spiritual evolution of 
man. Here was first pronounced the truth that God 
is worshiped neither at Jerusalem not in this moun- 
tain, but in the soul of the individual. 



[82] 



".* 




Photo by S. U. Mitman, Ph.D. 

RUINS AT JACOB'S WELL 



Y< 



VIEW NORTH FROM JEZREEL 



OU are now at one of the inspiring view-points in 
Palestine. Nazareth lies just off the picture to the left, 
Gilboa ninety degrees to the right. Behind you is the 
south-east end of Esdraelon, from which point the plain 
runs north-west along the base of the hills of Samaria, 
till it reaches its western apex at Mt. Carmel. The 
sense of space here is inspiring. Not till you have 
stood on Jezreel can you appreciate the description of 
this plain in the Blessing of Jacob, nor realize how its 
roads laid it open to the spoiler on every side: 

Issachar is a large-limbed ass 

Stretching himself between the sheep-folds: 

For he saw a resting-place that was good, 

And the land that it was pleasant. 

So he bowed his shoulder to bear 

And became a servant under task-work. 

This village of Jezreel was the seat of Ahab's summer 
palace and of Naboth's vineyard. The rich vale of 
Jezreel begins in front of you at the sea level, and sinks 
rapidly to the Jordan some seven hundred feet below 
sea level on your right (east). The mountain is Moreh 
or Little Hermon. Shunem is the dark smooch near 
the left edge of the picture and at the foot of the moun- 
tain. Nain is directly through the mountain. It was 
this whole slope of Moreh that the Midianites occupied, 
and it was these fields they reaped before Gideon made 
them think of home. 

These hills have looked down upon a pageant of 
history unmatched elsewhere in the world: on the 
elephants of Antiochus, the legions of Pompey who re- 
stored the liberties of the Decapolis, the fitters of Cleo- 
patra as she followed the eagles of Antony, victorious 
Vespasian, the hosts of Saladin driving before them the 
bannered lances of the Crusaders, and the hordes of the 
Bedouin who every century stamp out in the name of 
the Prophet whatever of civilization past wars have 
spared. More than fifty battles have been fought on 
these plains or near them. The last one of consequence 
occurred a mile beyond the west end of Moreh, where 
Napoleon's monstrous dream of world-conquest van- 
ished under the fierce onslaught of Turkish cavalry. 

[84] 




Stereograph copyrighted by Underwood & Underwood, N. Y. 
VIEW NORTH FROM JEZREEL 



GIDEON'S FOUNTAIN 

A HIS noble spring, called Gideon's Fountain or the 
Well of Harod, bursts out of the ground at the foot of 
a cave on the north slope of Mt. Gilboa. The mass of 
the mountain rises abruptly above the water and the 
stream sinks away towards the left (east) down the 
valley of Jezreel to Bethshan and the Jordan. Gideon's 
men rendezvoused in the glens above this spring, drank 
after the fashion of their modern successors in this pic- 
ture, and after making a flanking march to the west 
drove the Midianites down the valley eastward and over 
the "lip" of Jordan to Gilead. Saul tried to make this 
spring his base and the mountain his rear-guard; but 
the Philistine impact drove the host of Israel up the 
steep slope into the blind glens and wadies above, and 
there annihilated it. 

The writer never appreciated how easily an army 
could be confused here till he rode over Gilboa from the 
south and lost his way in the endeavor to find this 
spring. While from a distance the mountain looks 
fairly smooth and bare, he found that in reality it is 
cut up into ravines and hollows from which there is 
either no exit or only a narrow rocky glen where one 
man might stay a thousand. The paths down to the 
plain were so steep and rough that he had to, lead his 
horse most of the way. Then the patches of thorn-bush 
and scrub make ambushes inevitable and most effective. 
If Saul had not already been beaten in his heart before 
the battle, the Philistines could never have taken the 
mountain. As it was, panic made of these wild wadies 
a veritable slaughter-pen. 



[86] 




Stereograph copyrighted by Underwood & Underwood, N. Y. 
GIDEON'S FOUNTAIN 



Yc 



NAIN AND MOUNT TABOR 



OU are looking about north-east. To your right, 
three miles away, is Endor; to your left six miles Naza- 
reth perches on its hills. The top of Tabor in front of 
you is five miles distant as the bee flies. Your back is 
against Moreh. 

Nain is a mean village of one hundred and fifty 
Muslim inhabitants. It was raised from oblivion for a 
day by our Lord's immortal act, and then sank back to 
its proper doom. The only objects of interest are the 
tumble-down caravanserai on the roof of which you are 
standing, and the modest chapel in the middle ground 
built on the site of a Crusaders' church, which com- 
memorated the raising of the widow's son. 

The splendid dome of Tabor is fairly well wooded 
with scrub-oaks. The ruined fortifications on top, 
which do not show in the picture, are the work of 
Antiochus the Great, Josephus, and Melik the brother 
of Saladin. There are also within the enclosure a 
monastery belonging to the Latins and another to the 
Greeks. Their accompanying churches are the suc- 
cessors of those built by the Crusaders, which succeeded 
others of the fourth century, which in turn represented 
the tabernacles that Peter proposed to build at the time 
of the Transfiguration. Each sect, of course, claims to 
have the only and original site! However, the identifi- 
cation of Tabor with the Mount of Transfiguration is " 
erroneous — though the monks have not yet heard how 
the scholars have put them out of business! 

The view from Tabor is superb, particularly toward 
the north-east and south-east; great Hermon limiting 
the view on the one hand, and the high level fine of 
Gilead the other. You can trace practically the whole 
course of the Jordan from its rise among the roots of 
Hermon southward to the sea of Galilee; then sinking 
rapidly through the Ghor till the mist of distance hides 
alike the cleft and its containing mountains. The rich 
agricultural possibilities of this country strike one with 
peculiar force as the eye traverses from this elevation 
the swelling bosoms and the black-loamed undulating 
valleys of Galilee. 

[88] 




Stereograph copyrighted by Underwood & Underwood, N. Y. 
NAIN AND MOUNT TABOR 



THE SEA OF GALILEE 

J- HIS is one of the best views of the Sea of Galilee. 
It is taken from the Nazareth road as it winds down 
over the mountain. You are looking south-east The 
walled city of Tiberias is in the foreground. On the left 
are the steep slopes of the country of the Gergasenes, 
where the swine were drowned. On the right, just 
beyond the promontory, is the site of Tarichese, famed 
in Jesus' day for its pickled fish. Zebedee and his sons 
doubtless sold fish there for export to Rome. The exit 
of the Jordan is just beyond also. The table-land in 
the exact center of the picture is crowned with the ruins 
of Gadara, one of the cities of the Decapolis — a per- 
fectly superb site, and superbly occupied by a city that 
did credit to the energy of Rome and the culture of 
Greece. 

Immediately below its site, to the left, the sulphur- 
springs of Gadara burst from the ground and form 
great pools as blue as a robin's egg and as hot and evil- 
smelling as Gehenna. Ancient rheumatics and vale- 
tudinarians used to come hither even from Rome to 
drink the famous wine of the country, to eat the lus- 
cious grapes, to soak in the soothing waters, to enjoy 
the strange types of humanity that drifted through 
the colonnaded streets of Gadara, to laugh at the pro- 
vincial actors in the town theater, and doubtless to 
kick about their accommodations at the provincial 
hotels! This city must have been a perpetual chal- 
lenge to Jesus — a challenge that owing to early preju- 
dice he resisted till nearly the end of his ministry. 
With what amazement must he have seen for the 
first time the flux of humanity eddying through this 
foreign town, as intent upon business and sin as he was 
upon his weird gospel of love and trust. 

Tiberias, founded by Herod Antipas 16-22 a.d., was 
a city abhorred by pious Jews because of its intensely 
Roman character. Although so near the center of 
Jesus' ministry there is hardly a reference to it in the 
New Testament. Jesus probably never entered it. 
After the destruction of Jerusalem, a.d. 70, Tiberias 
became the chief seat of the Jewish nation. 



[90] 




Stereograph copyrighted by H. C. White Co. 

THE SEA OF GALILEE 



THE PLAIN OF GENNESARET 

A HIS picture is taken from Khan Minyeh on the 
northwest corner of the Sea of Galilee. You look over a 
level and once fertile plain, covered in Jesus' day with a 
score of prosperous villages. Magdala, home of Mary 
Magdalene, lies at the foot of the hills at the extreme 
left. Above it, the highest point of land is the abrupt 
volcanic cliff whose caves were for ages the haunt of 
robbers. Herod the Great, while still a youth, made his 
reputation as a soldier by sending a body of troops in 
cages down the face of the cliff and smoking the bandits 
out. Mt. Tabor lies to the right of this peak. To the 
right of Tabor and impinging upon it are the Horns of 
Hattin, a broken crater on whose slopes Jesus is (errone- 
ously) said to have uttered the Sermon on the Mount. 
Here Saladin broke the flower of European chivalry in 
1 187 a.d. and after seven assaults captured the tent of 
the Latin King of Jerusalem on its summit. The hill 
of Nazareth — our view-point — appears faintly about 
half an inch from the right-hand corner of the picture. 
Across the plain almost at your feet runs the great 
caravan trunk line on its way from the East to the sea 
and Egypt. Matthew was a custom-house officer on 
this line. His station, Capernaum, is behind you to the 
left, about two miles away. 

You are therefore in this picture at the very heart 
of the Gospels. It was here that Jesus healed the sick, 
stilled the tempest, cast out demons, fed the hungry, 
preached good tidings to the poor, spoke his immortal 
parables, found his friends and made his enemies. And 
all this work was done under conditions of climate that 
most of us have never realized. This plain lies in a 
sweltering hollow six hundred and eighty- two feet below 
sea level. On a hundred and sixty- three days of the 
year the temperature is above ninety degrees, and on 
forty-five of these it is more than one hundred degrees. 



[02] 




Photo by S. U. Mitman, Ph.D. 

THE PLAIN OF GENNESARET 



A CARAVAN 

A RECISELY this kind of freight train has passed over 
the trunk roads of Galilee since the dawn of civilization. 
From the miscellaneous assortment of bundles on this 
caravan one might judge this to be a return trip, and the 
freight to be kerosene, tobacco, matches, fire-arms and 
the like, all products of the West. The down-load was 
undoubtedly grain. In Jesus' day the "through trains " 
westward belonged to merchants carrying goodly pearls 
and other gems, together with the spices, the medicines, 
the indigo, the rich garments, the slave-eunuchs, 
carpets and leather of the East; the "locals" carried 
grain from the Hauran, pickled fish from the Sea of 
Galilee, linen, wool, raisins and wine. Eastward trains 
brought as today the luxuries of the West, — the manu- 
factures of Alexandria and the Greek cities of the Medi- 
terranean, articles of bronze and pottery, of iron and tin, 
the household and military equipment of the soldiers 
and governors. The lines of the Roman roads can still 
be traced by the current ones, by the fragments of 
pavement and the great caravaserais, mostly now in 
ruin. 

Unfortunately this caravan is traveling on a carriage 
road such as did not exist in Jesus' day. The usual 
trail is not a road at all. Often it is not a single path 
but a maze of paths, little trails that interlace and 
fuse and ramify, that drift sideways up a hill in the 
rainy season to avoid the mud, and drift downward in 
the dry to avoid the hills. But if the trails sprawl over 
the valleys, they collect themselves in the passes. 
Where the limestone ledges begin to crop, the huddling 
feet fall century after century in the same spot. Where 
a whole stratum protrudes terrace-wise, it becomes 
slippery with the attrition of ages; now and then the 
trail is filled with jagged chunks that roll under your 
horse's tread and offer the same thoroughfare that a 
ruined wall might; but whether smooth or rough, it is 
all brown with the treading of generations, "merchants 
— Ishmaelites — with their camels, going down to 
Egypt." 



[94] 



v.. 




Photo by S. U. Mitman, Ph.D. 

A CARAVAN 



SEPPHORIS 

A HIS view represents Sepphoris as seen from the 
Nazareth-Cana road. You are facing north-west. 
The old town looks for all the world like a barnacled 
rock emerging from the green waves of the valley 
While less elevated than Nazareth it is delightfully 
situated. Its copious springs and its dominating posi- 
tion have made it a stronghold and determined its 
history. Not mentioned in the Bible, it has for us an 
interest as the traditional birthplace of St. Joachim, 
the father of the Virgin. As early as the fourth cen- 
tury Count Joseph of Tiberias believed that the par- 
ents of the Virgin lived here, for he built a basilica on 
the site of their home. By the sixth century a chapel 
stood on the spot where Mary was said to have been 
hailed by the angel. Sepphoris and Nazareth are thus 
at loggerheads about the location of this particular 
event. 

Although its entire population is Muslim the city 
is sacred to the Jews, for in 180 a.d. the Great San- 
hedrim, unable to convene in paganized Jerusalem 
took up its abode here till a Jewish revolt in 33o, a.d., 
caused the destruction of the city. 

Sepphoris fades from history on the fateful eve of 
the battle of Hattin. All the Christian leaders as- 
sembled here, — Guy the Latin King of Jerusalem, 
Reginald the perfidious Lord of Kerak, Raymond of 
Tripoli and Tiberias, Balian the Master of the Temple, 
who here paid over to Guy the gold sent by King Henry 
of England in expiation of Becket's murder. And here 
the fatal mistake was made of leaving the springs and 
advancing over a waterless plain to the Horns of Hat- 
tin, where on July 4th, 1187, the flower of European 
knighthood perished of thirst and wounds under a 
pitiless sun and the resistless charges of Saladin. 



[96] 




..■■■ 






Photo by S. U. Mitman, Ph.D. 

SEPPHORIS 

(The light patch beginning on the middle hill under the cross 

and extending an inch to the left.) 



PTOLEMAIS (ACRE) 

-I HIS town of many names first comes to light in the 
Tell el-Amarna tablets (fourteenth century b.c.) as 
Acca. The book of Judges calls it Accho. During the 
Greek period the Egyptian ruler of Palestine renamed it 
Ptolemais, and as such it was known in the time of 
Christ, when it was port of entry for all Syria. By the 
seventh century a.d. the Arabs had restored its old name. 
The crusaders took it, re-christened it St. John of Acre, 
and made it the chief bulwark of Christian dominion in 
the East. Richard of England and Saladin have popu- 
larized it by their deeds of valor beneath its walls. 
During its long and stormy history it has suffered at 
least twenty- three sieges. Among the great names 
connected with it are Sennacherib, Alexander, Herod 
the Great, St. Paul, Baldwin, St. Francis of Assisi, 
and Napoleon. 

Though the town itself is not visible from Nazareth, 
one can easily discern the ships in the bay, if the air is 
clear. 



[98] 




Photo by S. U. Mitman, Ph.D. 

PTOLEMAIS (ACRE) 



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